The experience of being a Frontier Nursing University student is unique and one you won’t find elsewhere. We offer a supportive student network, amazing faculty and staff, and an opportunity to complete a graduate education online from your home community. While coursework is completed online, one to two campus immersion experiences are part of the FNU journey, including an orientation prior to beginning studies, and an intensive skills workshop prior to beginning the clinical practicum in the student’s home area.
Our alumni will tell you that this tradition is one of their most treasured memories as an FNU student. We invite you to take your own tour and learn more about our home in Versailles, Kentucky.
President’s House
Where else to begin the tour but at the Welcome Center? This is where students check in as they arrive on campus for Frontier and Clinical Bounds. Just behind the Welcome Center is the trailhead for the 5K trail around campus. The trail features several connector trails and a scenic walk around the wooded campus. The trailhead is also the location of the Land Acknowledgement marker, which recognizes this as the traditional territory of the Cherokee and Shawnee people.
Next on the tour of campus is the Community Center. This Center contains a large auditorium for campus-wide events, accommodating up to 120 people. Smaller breakout rooms accommodate about 25 people per room.
The Learning Center is home to the university’s simulation labs. It is here that students who are ready to begin their clinical experience spend time on campus attending Clinical Bound where they practice their clinical skills. FNU employs standardized patients who follow a script written by faculty to create a realistic patient interaction for the student. Students also utilize mannequin-style models to practice hands-on skills, such as hand maneuvers for attending births and suturing techniques. These simulations allow students to experience patient interactions in a simulated environment and prepare them to see actual patients in real clinical settings. Simulations are offered in all four specialties to nurse-midwifery, family nurse practitioner, women’s health nurse practitioner, and psychiatric-mental health nurse practitioner students.
The President’s House was built in 1854 and extensively renovated in 2021. Despite the name, the university president does not reside at the President’s House. Instead, the house offers ample indoor and exterior space to host various events and receptions and four bedrooms to accommodate guests.
The Student Services building houses the FNU Library which provides high quality, evidence-based resources to support students, alumni and faculty in their careers as healthcare leaders.
IT Services is also located in the Student Services building. The IT team supports the FNU Community in using technology in creative, innovative, and immersive ways to advance and support the mission and goals of the university.
Students will also find the Academic Advising office here. Frontier Nursing University takes a multi-layered, collaborative approach to academic advising. In addition to the faculty who are with students every step of the way with coursework, FNU assigns each student an Academic Advisor and a Regional Clinical Faculty member (RCF) to provide support and direction from the point of admission to degree completion.
While most of the existing buildings on our historical campus were renovated, the Dining Hall is a newly-constructed building. Here, three meals a day are prepared by our chef and his staff when hosting on-campus student sessions and events. The dining hall offers seating for 120 people. The campus gift shop and gym is located downstairs from the dining room.
A long-standing tradition at Frontier is the bell-ringing ceremony held at the end of each Bound week and after commencement. Before returning home from their campus visits, Frontier Bound and Clinical Bound students convene at the Bell Pavilion and take turns one-by-one ringing the bell to signify the beginning of a new chapter.
Combined, the three student lodges have a total capacity of 100 students. Community bathrooms are located on each floor, and each lodge has a kitchenette with a microwave, a full-size refrigerator, dishes and more. The exterior design of the lodges was “Frontierized,” which is to say that the lodges were intentionally made to look very much like the buildings on FNU’s previous campus in Hyden.
The faculty and staff house serves as housing for visiting faculty and staff members. FNU has over 250 faculty and staff members located all over the country. Much like the students, faculty travel to campus for Frontier and Clinical Bounds.
The Administration Building contains two conference rooms and several administrative and staff offices, including the President’s Office.
The Reflection Center offers a place for anyone on campus to have quiet space to reflect, pray, meditate, or pursue whatever form of solace they seek.
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Potter’s practice collaborates with the Knoxville Black Doula Collective, contributing to the Knoxville Black Maternal Health Symposium, and soon, will offer Spanish interpretive services. Additionally, they host monthly community breastfeeding classes and open-to-all postpartum support groups. Her commitment to maternal and perinatal mental health is highlighted by her certification through Postpartum Support International as a Certified Perinatal Mental Health Professional.
Carrie Belin is an experienced board-certified Family Nurse Practitioner and a graduate of the Johns Hopkins DNP program, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Georgetown University School of Nursing, and Johns Hopkins School of Nursing. She has also completed fellowships at Georgetown and the University of California Irvine.
Angie has been a full-scope midwife since 2009. She has experience in various birth settings including home, hospital, and birth centers. She is committed to integrating the midwifery model of care in the US. She completed her master’s degree in nurse-midwifery at Frontier Nursing University (FNU) and her Doctorate at Johns Hopkins University. She currently serves as the midwifery clinical faculty at FNU. Angie is motivated by the desire to improve the quality of healthcare and has led quality improvement projects on skin-to-skin implementation, labor induction, and improving transfer of care practices between hospital and community midwives. In 2017, she created a short film on skin-to-skin called 
Justin C. Daily, BSN, RN, has ten years of experience in nursing. At the start of his nursing career, Justin worked as a floor nurse on the oncology floor at St. Francis. He then spent two years as the Director of Nursing in a small rural Kansas hospital before returning to St. Francis and the oncology unit. He has been in his current position as the Chemo Nurse Educator for the past four years. He earned an Associate in Nurse from Hutchinson Community College and a Bachelor of Science in Nursing from Bethel College.
Brandy Jackson serves as the Director of Undergraduate Nursing Programs and Assistant Educator at Wichita State University and Co-Director of Access in Nursing. Brandy is a seasoned educator with over 15 years of experience. Before entering academia, Brandy served in Hospital-based leadership and Critical Care Staff nurse roles. Brandy is passionate about equity in nursing education with a focus on individuals with disabilities. Her current research interests include accommodations of nursing students with disabilities in clinical learning environments and breaking down barriers for historically unrepresented individuals to enter the nursing profession. Brandy is also actively engaged in Interprofessional Education development, creating IPE opportunities for faculty and students at Wichita State. Brandy is an active member of Wichita Women for Good and Soroptimist, with the goal to empower women and girls. Brandy is a TeamSTEPPS master trainer. She received the DASIY Award for Extraordinary Nursing Faculty in 2019 at Wichita State University. 
Dr. Sabrina Ali Jamal-Eddine is an Arab-disabled queer woman of color with a PhD in Nursing and an interdisciplinary certificate in Disability Ethics from the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC). Dr. Jamal-Eddine’s doctoral research explored spoken word poetry as a form of critical narrative pedagogy to educate nursing students about disability, ableism, and disability justice. Dr. Jamal-Eddine now serves as a Postdoctoral Research Associate in UIC’s Department of Disability and Human Development and serves on the Board of Directors of the National Organization of Nurses with Disabilities (NOND). During her doctoral program, Sabrina served as a Summer Fellow at a residential National Endowment of the Humanities (NEH) Summer Institute at Arizona State University (2023), a summer fellow at Andrew W. Mellon’s National Humanities Without Walls program at University of Michigan (2022), a Summer Research Fellow at UC Berkeley’s Othering & Belonging Institute (2021), and an Illinois Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental and related Disabilities (LEND) trainee (2019-2020).
Vanessa Cameron works for Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nursing Education & Professional Development. She is also attending George Washington University and progressing towards a PhD in Nursing with an emphasis on ableism in nursing. After becoming disabled in April 2021, Vanessa’s worldview and perspective changed, and a recognition of the ableism present within healthcare and within the culture of nursing was apparent. She has been working since that time to provide educational foundations for nurses about disability and ableism, provide support for fellow disabled nursing colleagues, and advocate for the disabled community within healthcare settings to reduce disparities.
Dr. Lucinda Canty is a certified nurse-midwife, Associate Professor of Nursing, and Director of the Seedworks Health Equity in Nursing Program at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She earned a bachelor’s degree in nursing from Columbia University, a master’s degree from Yale University, specializing in nurse-midwifery, and a PhD from the University of Connecticut. Dr. Canty has provided reproductive health care for over 29 years. Her research interests include the prevention of maternal mortality and severe maternal morbidity, reducing racial and ethnic health disparities in reproductive health, promoting diversity in nursing, and eliminating racism in nursing and midwifery.
Dr. Lisa Meeks is a distinguished scholar and leader whose unwavering commitment to inclusivity and excellence has significantly influenced the landscape of health professions education and accessibility. She is the founder and executive director of the DocsWithDisabilities Initiative and holds appointments as an Associate Professor in the Departments of Learning Health Sciences and Family Medicine at the University of Michigan.
Dr. Nikia Grayson, DNP, MSN, MPH, MA, CNM, FNP-C, FACNM (she/her) is a trailblazing force in reproductive justice, blending her expertise as a public health activist, anthropologist, and family nurse-midwife to champion the rights and health of underserved communities. Graduating with distinction from Howard University, Nikia holds a bachelor’s degree in communications and a master’s degree in public health. Her academic journey also led her to the University of Memphis, where she earned a master’s in medical anthropology, and the University of Tennessee, where she achieved both a master’s in nursing and a doctorate in nursing practice. Complementing her extensive education, she completed a post-master’s certificate in midwifery at Frontier Nursing University.
Dr. Tia Brown McNair is the Vice President in the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Student Success and Executive Director for the Truth, Racial Healing, and Transformation (TRHT) Campus Centers at the American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) in Washington, DC. She oversees both funded projects and AAC&U’s continuing programs on equity, inclusive excellence, high-impact practices, and student success. McNair directs AAC&U’s Summer Institutes on High-Impact Practices and Student Success, and TRHT Campus Centers and serves as the project director for several AAC&U initiatives, including the development of a TRHT-focused campus climate toolkit. She is the lead author of From Equity Talk to Equity Walk: Expanding Practitioner Knowledge for Racial Justice in Higher Education (January 2020) and Becoming a Student-Ready College: A New Culture of Leadership for Student Success (July 2016 and August 2022 Second edition).